


silver medal

by ShowMeAHero



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Pennywise (IT), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Richie Tozier, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Fluff, Friends With Benefits, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, Jewish Richie Tozier, M/M, Richie Tozier Has a Big Dick, Sub Top Richie Tozier, Top Eddie Kaspbrak, Top Stanley Uris
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:08:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23417230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShowMeAHero/pseuds/ShowMeAHero
Summary: Richie told Stan he was in love with Eddie when they were all still six years old. Stan still knows that, hestillkeeps that secret, even after all these years. Not just that Richie had been in love with Eddie then, but that he’s still in love with himnow;that he’s neverstoppedloving Eddie, that’s he’s pretty sure it’s impossible for him toeverstop.Now, though, he’s finally getting the turnabout he’s wanted for so long, becauseStan’sfinally in love with someone, too.
Relationships: Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Bill Denbrough/Mike Hanlon, Eddie Kaspbrak/Original Male Character(s), Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Patricia Blum Uris/Original Male Character(s), Patricia Blum Uris/Stanley Uris, Richie Tozier/Stanley Uris
Comments: 24
Kudos: 322





	silver medal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sabisun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabisun/gifts).



> For [sabisun](https://twitter.com/sabisuns)!

Richie and Stan don’t need diaries, because they have each other.

They’ve had each other since they were little,  _ little  _ kids, basically still babies, when their mothers would take them to synagogue together and leave them together in the playpen in the basement so they wouldn’t disrupt anything. Bill and Eddie were best friends, then, and Stan and Richie were best friends; they wouldn’t all start hanging out together until they were five, and they all swore to be best friends forever when they were seven, which is still a long time.

Regardless. Before he had all of that, Richie had Stan. He knows he can confide anything in him, and that Stan can tell him anything in return. It’s been that way for twenty-seven years.

All this to say, Richie told Stan he was in love with Eddie when they were all still six years old. Stan still knows that, he  _ still  _ keeps that secret, even after all these years. Not just that Richie had been in love with Eddie then, but that he’s still in love with him  _ now;  _ that he’s never  _ stopped  _ loving Eddie, that’s he’s pretty sure it’s impossible for him to  _ ever  _ stop.

Now, though, he’s finally getting the turnabout he’s wanted for so long, because  _ Stan’s  _ finally in love with someone, too.

“Her name is Patty,” Stan says, the first time he tells Richie about her. “We met five months ago, Richie, but I think I’m— I think I’m really in love with her, though.”

Richie locks his bedroom door like anyone’s going to come in. They’ve been sharing an apartment with Bill and Mike since they were all starting grad school five years ago. Bill and Mike aren’t home right now, though. It’s just them.

“You think so?” Richie says. He flops backwards onto his bed, rolling his head to look at Stan where he’s curled up against the headboard. He’s got his arms twined around his knees, his chin propped up on his wrist.

“I do,” Stan tells him. He sighs, then drops his hand down to pick at a thread on Richie’s comforter. “I just— We’re really good friends, and I thought we were going somewhere, Rich. I really did. And today she just—” Stan exhales roughly, then yanks on the thread. Richie reaches out and threads his fingers through Stan’s to pull him away.

“What’d she do to you?” Richie asks. He bounces their hands on the mattress gently while Stan’s face goes red. “Hey, you can tell me. I’m not gonna make fun of you until I know you’re feeling one-hundred-percent better, I promise.”

The corners of Stan’s lips twitched up. He sighs again, then looks up at Richie. It only takes a beat before he’s looking away again, but that eye contact is all Stan needs to say, “She told me she’s going on a date. With this guy, and it’s their third date, and his name is Reed, and she said he’s— She  _ likes  _ him. She said he’s  _ nice.”  _ He makes a disgusted sound, then says, “Wh— Am I  _ not _ nice? Richie, am I not  _ nice?” _

“Of course you’re nice, Stan, you’re nice,” Richie assures him in a rush. He releases him so he can sit cross-legged in front of him. Tipping his face down so he can look into Stan’s eyes again, he starts tugging at his wrists to unfold his arms from his legs and his legs from his body. It works, and it loosens up Stan’s joints a little, too. He’s smiling slightly by the time Richie’s got Stan’s legs on either side of him and their hands tangled together.

“Patty doesn’t think I’m nice,” Stan tells him.

“Patty  _ does  _ think you’re nice,” Richie disagrees. “Look, when has describing somebody as  _ nice  _ ever actually  _ meant  _ that they’re nice? It means he’s  _ boring,  _ Stan. There’s nothing better to say about him so she just says he’s  _ nice.” _

Stan furrows his brow, staring down at their joined hands. Richie pushes his advantage.

“And regardless,” Richie says, “if she’s not dating you, she’s off her nut. She’s  _ completely  _ into you, I can tell when you’re together, man. Maybe she thinks  _ you’re  _ not into  _ her.  _ You can be a little, uhh—”

“Watch it,” Stan warns. He smiles again when he lifts his head to look at Richie again.

“A little mysterious,” Richie settles on. He’d been about to say,  _ “You can be a little closed-off,”  _ but that’s not helpful. Stan has a hard enough time verbalizing without Richie ragging on him for it, so instead he just continues to say, “Do you want me to say something to her? Chat with her, maybe drop some hints—”

_ “No,”  _ Stan cuts him off. “No, no, I’m— I’ll handle it.”

“You’ll  _ handle  _ it?” Richie asks. Stan squeezes his hands, then leans forward slightly. Richie meets him halfway, leaning forwards until their foreheads meet and they’re pressed together. “You should talk to her.”

“It’s hard,” Stan reminds him. “I shouldn’t need to tell  _ you  _ that—”

“Whoa, hey, Eds is off-limits in this conversation,” Richie interrupts him, jerking back. Stan laughs, catching him by the arm to hold him close. “This is about  _ you,  _ Stan, and  _ Patty,  _ and the wonderful  _ love  _ you two share—”

“Stop,  _ stop,”  _ Stan says. He lets Richie go to bury his face in his hands. “We’re not _ in love,  _ because  _ we  _ are not anything. There is no  _ we.  _ She’s dating Reed and Eddie’s dating Isaac and that’s— That’s that, Rich. That’s that, we’re  _ fucked,  _ they’re  _ never  _ gonna want us—”

“Hey, man,” Richie says, but his voice breaks. His chest just fucking hurts to hear Stan saying what he tells himself everyday. “That’s not cool, they— We—”

“It’s not because of you,” Stan tells him firmly. “You’re a great guy, Rich. I’ve always told you, you know that. Eddie’s— He should— Mm. He should’ve just—”

“Yeah, I know,” Richie says, because it’s just sad to watch Stan struggle like this. “There’s nothing for it, man. Nothing to do. I’ve turned it over and over in my head for years, I’m out of options. He’s not interested and he’s not gonna be.”

The two of them sit in silence for a long, quiet couple of minutes before Stan says, “I don’t know what I’m going to do now, Richie. I love her so much. What am I supposed to do?”

Richie shrugs, and he makes to pull away and stand, but Stan catches him by the wrist and keeps him close. After a beat, he says, “Move on, I guess.”

Stan rolls his eyes. “Because you’ve done such a wonderful job—”

“I didn’t say I’ve taken my own fucking advice, Stanley,” Richie says. Stan laughs again as Richie says, “You’ve got a lot to offer, Stan. Plus, you’ve got a ton of options, y’know, Mister Pansexual—”

“Just because I’m attracted to people doesn’t mean they’re attracted to me,” Stan says, just the wrong side of too quiet. Richie reaches up and cups Stan’s face in his hands to force him to make eye contact and keep it.

“Stan, you are one of the handsomest people I’ve ever seen in my  _ life,”  _ Richie tells him. Stan laughs, but Richie says, as firm as he can manage, “No, I’m serious, Stan. You’re so pretty and you’re the smartest guy I know. You’re so kind and warm and good, you make— You’re such a good friend. I know you’d do anything for me. I love you a whole lot, man, don’t talk smack about yourself.”

The whole time he’s talking, Stan’s face gets pinker and pinker. By the end of his speech, he’s gone all red-faced and he’s squirming to get out of Richie’s tight hold. Richie just pulls his face back to center stage and makes eye contact again.

“I love you, Stan,” Richie says firmly. “Don’t doubt yourself.”

Stan nods, his eyes flickering down, then back up to Richie’s eyes. Richie smiles at him, and Stan smiles back, sending warmth through Richie like a flood. In the next moment, it’s chased by ice water rushing through his veins as Stan surges forward and kisses him.

Richie jerks backwards, and the two of them keep eye contact in horrified silence for a long,  _ long  _ moment. After that, Richie asks, “What are you— What are you thinking, Stan?”

Stan shakes his head, but Richie reaches out for him before he can run away. His heart’s racing and his brain is buzzing, but he also feels wanted in a way he never has before. He’s loved Eddie for so fucking long, there’s never been space for anyone else. He’s never  _ made  _ space for anyone else.

“I’m so sorry,” Stan says. “I just thought that I can’t have her and you can’t have E— You can’t have him, so I thought—” He shakes his head. “I shouldn’t have done that. That was ridiculous, I shouldn’t have—”

“That’s not what I mean,” Richie tells him. “I just— I’m in love with Eddie, Stan. I don’t want to be a dick to you if we start something and I can’t get over him, you deserve so much better than someone who’s still in love with someone else—”

“No, no,” Stan cuts him off. He laughs, a little more relaxed this time, and says, “I meant more about— about getting over our feelings. For us to just try getting over them for right now.” Stan shakes his head, face going red again, and says, “I just don’t want to think about her for a while, Rich. It hurts too fucking much.”

Richie gets that. When he digs into his feelings about Eddie, it’s like taking a knife to an old scar and cutting it right back open again: it’s going to hurt, and it’s going to bleed, and it’s going to take a long time to heal again. When it does heal, the scar is going to be worse than it was the last time. He tries not to think about the situation with Eddie, because all it does is hurt. He can’t change it; all he can do is endure it.

“Okay,” Richie says. Stan’s eyes focus back up on Richie’s again.

“Okay?” Stan asks.

“Okay,” Richie repeats. “You’re right, I just— I’m so tired of being alone, Stan.” Richie shakes his head and fails to stop his voice from breaking when he says, “I’m so fucking lonely. I don’t want to be lonely anymore.”

Stan nods. His eyes drift down again, and Richie realizes, belatedly, that he’s looking at his lips. He looks at Stan’s lips, too, just to really  _ see.  _ He’s thought about kissing Stan before, yeah, but he’s thought about kissing pretty much everybody he’s ever seen. There are very few people he’s ever considered kissing seriously; the people he  _ has  _ kissed, he really didn’t kiss all that seriously. It’s always been Eddie, in the back of his mind.

On the one hand, it’s  _ hard,  _ being with somebody who isn’t Eddie. On the other hand, though, it’s so  _ fucking  _ easy to shift forward softly and press his lips to Stan’s again. Stan knows all about Eddie, and he’s not going to push Richie for more, because he’s got Patty in the back of his mind, too.

Stan loves him, anyways. Not how Richie wants to be loved, but Stan isn’t the one Richie wants loving him that way, so it’s fine, really. It’s good to be fucking  _ touched. _

And Stan picks up on it  _ fast,  _ how much he likes to be touched. When his hand first skims over Richie’s hip, his hand cool when it slips over his pajama pants and up under his t-shirt, Richie full-body  _ shivers.  _ Stan’s mouth shifts into a smile where they’re kissing.

“Is this okay?” Stan asks. Richie nods quickly, only twice before Stan’s kissing him again, cupping his face in one hand and gripping his waist tight in the other. Stan’s kisses deepen now that he has explicit permission. His touch digs in harder, his tongue slides hot against Richie’s before he moves to get into his lap; Richie holds him by the hips as he pushes Richie up against the headboard and kisses him again.

Richie doesn’t try to speak, because he doesn’t want to risk the wrong words coming out. Instead, he just lets himself fall into sensation and feeling alone. It feels fucking good to be touched this way; he’s had a few boyfriends, in the last few years, and a couple of girlfriends before he came out. He’s  _ had _ sex. Just— Not sex where he wasn’t spending half his time trying not to think about  _ Eddie. _

_ “Yes,”  _ Stan gasps. Richie wants to hear it again, wants to hear that confirmation that he’s doing something right and making Stan feel good, so he drops his head down and kisses along Stan’s neck. Stan twitches, a full-body jerk, so Richie  _ bites  _ there. “Rich—”

Richie can’t answer, because his mouth is busy, teeth biting into the thin skin over Stan’s delicate collarbone. Stan doesn’t weigh all that much, and he’s not that sturdy, but he’s a fucking  _ presence  _ like this in Richie’s lap. His bones aren’t light and his condition isn’t delicate. He’s full of fire and heat and  _ power,  _ and he  _ shoves  _ into Richie, pinning his arms back against the headboard by his wrists.

“Can I top?” Stan asks, chest heaving us as he readjusts himself, shifting up so his legs bracket Richie’s folded-up body, back straight as he looks down at Richie, stroking his hair back from his face.

“Yeah, of course,” Richie tells him. Stan kisses him again, his hands cupping Richie’s face all along his jaw. His touch turns bruising, and it makes Richie  _ moan,  _ a sound like he’s never heard before from himself falling from his own mouth.

“Good, Richie,” Stan murmurs, kissing him again before he kisses over to his cheek, down the line from his temple to his jawline, down the column of his throat. Richie gets his hands on the hem of Stan’s sweater and tugs it up and off over his head. He’s only able to get that far before Stan’s pinning him back again.

Stan pulls back just long enough to pull off his button-down, untucking it swiftly and undoing three buttons before just twisting to tug the entire shirt up and off. He strips off his undershirt, then grabs Richie’s hands and puts them on his sides himself.

“You can touch me,” Stan tells him. “I want you to.”

Richie nods jerkily, then runs his hands up to Stan’s chest. His palms and fingers are huge, compared to Stan’s body, covering his nipples and spanning the breadth of his abdomen. He glides them up to his shoulders, then down to his waist. There, he unbuckles Stan’s belt and unbuttons his pants.

“Where’s your lube?” Stan asks, watching Richie closely as his flushed-pink cheeks, a blush spread across his chest like butter. Richie reaches up to thread his hands through Stan’s hair, just to mess up his curls a little bit. Stan smiles at him like he knows just what he’s doing. “Rich. Focus.”

“Mm.” Richie scoots over a little bit, Stan shifting with him. He finagles the drawer of his nightstand open and gives Stan lube and a condom. Stan lifts the condom up between two crossed fingers.

“Do you want me to use a condom?” Stan asks. The two of them look at each other for a long, long moment before Richie shakes his head. Stan puts the condom back down on his nightstand. “If you change your mind, tell me. Okay? Anytime.”

“Okay, yeah,” Richie says, nodding his head as Stan kisses him again. Stan’s hands are quick, tugging Richie’s pants off and over his hips, down his legs, tossing them aside before he gets up to get the rest of his own clothes off.

He moves precisely, taking each article of clothing off and then throwing it onto the chair when he’s done with it. It almost makes Richie laugh, the contrast between how neatly he takes clothes off and how aggressively he tosses them aside. He kicks his socks off while he waits, then looks to Stan expectantly.

“Shirt off,” Stan tells him. Richie sits up, then hesitates. Stan’s thin, strong, lithe; Eddie’s compact, tight, muscular; Patty’s thin, fit, small; everyone Stan’s dated has looked more handsome than Richie.

“I don’t— Are you sure you want—” Richie starts to ask. Stan  _ tsks  _ at him to cut him off, brow furrowed.

“I want to see all of you,” Stan says. “Is that okay with you?”

Richie pauses to actually consider this question. In the end, he remembers it’s Stan, and he nods, stripping his shirt off over his head.

Stan smiles at him, when he’s sitting there in his boxers, feeling like a kid sitting in an empty bathtub, for a moment. The feeling disappears when Stan strips his tight boxer-briefs off and tosses them aside, too.

Richie’s seen Stan naked before, a few times. He learns quickly that context counts for a  _ lot,  _ because Stan climbing up and over him with a bottle of lube in his hands and heat simmering low in the dark depths of his eyes is  _ very  _ different from Stan coming out of the shower. Stan’s cock is pretty, just like the rest of him, and Richie can’t help but groan again when they make skin-to-skin contact. Their thighs slip against each other before slotting together as Stan settles back down in his lap.

“Sit up,” Stan tells him. Richie straightens up, and Stan continues, “Hips up,” so Richie does as he’s told. Stan takes advantage of the position to strip Richie’s boxers down and off, shimmying them down his legs and under himself until they’re around his ankles. “Kick ‘em off, Rich.”

Richie does, and he hears them hit the ground with a soft  _ whump  _ as Stan kisses him again. He leans up into it, lets Stan’s hands blaze trails across his skin, heat and fire licking along as Stan goes. The slick sounds of their mouths meeting over and over, open-mouthed and wet, are cut by the crack of the lube bottle opening.

“Spread your legs,” Stan instructs him. Richie kisses him again before doing it, letting Stan place himself in between his thighs. He bends his legs, guiding his knees up. When he has a good angle, his slick fingers circle Richie’s hole; Richie jerks up into him, and Stan catches him against his chest.

“Fuck,” Richie manages, choked. Stan shushes him, stroking his dry hand down Richie’s back as he holds him close.

“Shh, Richie, relax,” Stan tells him. Richie inhales, long and slow, then exhales. As soon as his breath starts to go out, Stan slips his index fingertip in.

“No going back now,” Richie comments. Stan pinches the back of his neck before shifting back so he can catch his finger slipping into Richie’s hole.

“No, there’s no going back now,” Stan says, before he kisses Richie again as he keeps fingering him open. Richie’s hard before he’s halfway done, cock curved up and leaking between their bellies as Stan slips a second finger in, then a third. Richie falls apart under his hands, melting to molasses, feeling so fucking— so fucking close to Stan, in this moment, and he doesn’t feel so fucking alone. It feels  _ good. _

“C’mon, Stan,” Richie says, confident now that he’ll say the right name. Stan’s nothing like Eddie, and he’s sure they’d be different in bed, which doesn’t matter if he doesn’t focus enough on Stan to ever compare. That is, if he gets a wish from a genie with loose morals or something, one willing to let Richie be selfish and ask for just a kiss from Eddie, if nothing else, before he dies. “Stan—”

“I’ve got you,” Stan assures him. He slips his fingers out in one fluid movement, and Richie  _ groans,  _ empty and bereft. Luckily, Stan’s not far behind him, slicking himself up and bringing the head of his cock to Richie’s entrance. Richie can feel him there, the blunt head of his cock pushing into him one inch at a time; his hand shoots up to tangle in Stan’s hair. Stan bites down hard enough on his lip to draw blood.

“Oh, fucking—  _ Fuck,”  _ Richie spits, and Stan draws back sharply. “No, no, it’s good, that’s good, keep going—”

Stan takes that to heart, apparently, because he slams Richie’s wrists back into the headboard as he pushes the rest of the way into him.

The two of them stop for a moment, adjusting to the feeling. Richie can feel sweat slicking his face; Stan lets go of one of his hands when he tugs, and he wipes his face with the back of his hand before pushing his hair back. Stan rolls his eyes, and it’s so  _ Stan. _

“Okay,  _ now  _ there’s no going back,” Richie tells him. Stan laughs again, kissing Richie one last time before he starts fucking him in earnest.

Stan doesn’t mess around. He fucks like a champion, like he’s going to get a fucking trophy for it at the end; every one of Richie’s nerve endings lights up when Stan’s cock slams into his prostate. He whines something that might be Stan’s name before his mouth’s busy, caught again with Stan’s as Stan drags him down horizontally and fucks him into the mattress.

Richie can feel heat pooling quick, even though Stan’s not even touching his dick. He’s embarrassed, briefly, face flushing, but Stan draws him back up.

“Hey,” Stan murmurs. He kisses him, his hips slowing before he asks, “What is it?”

“I’m—” Richie starts to say, but Stan shifts, and he  _ keens,  _ back arching up until Stan catches him with one hand. Stan smiles down at him, looking proud and determined and delighted. Richie half-laughs, his breath catching in his throat as Stan kisses him. “Wait, wait— I’m so close, Stan,  _ fuck,  _ slow down—”

“Richie, f—  _ fuck,  _ I just—” Stan moves back, fixes his angle and fucks into Richie  _ hard.  _ He finds the right angle based on the sounds Richie makes, and he keeps a whole stream of praise going as Richie gets fucked into the mattress by him, telling Richie, “Good job, I’m so proud of you, you’re doing so well, come on, there you go—”

“Stan, please,” Richie chokes out. Stan kisses him and wraps a hand around his cock. Richie shudders, his back curving again as it arches him up into Stan. It just drives his cock deeper, and he cums  _ hard,  _ painting their chests and Stan’s hand. Stan grins, kissing him again.

“Good work,” Stan murmurs against Richie’s cheek. Richie can still feel the waves of pleasure rolling through him, lava-waves of heat like a waterfall inside of him. He exhales; Stan shifts, and lightning bolts of overstimulation shoot through him.

_ “Fuck,”  _ Richie says. “Fuck— Go ahead, Stan, c’mon—”

“Are you s—”

_ “Yes,”  _ Richie insists. Stan trusts him, clearly, because he picks his pace back up then doubles it, fucking Richie hard and fast until he’s found his own climax. Richie pulls him in and holds him close as he cums, stroking his back until Stan pushes his forehead into his shoulder.

“Fuck,” Stan says. Richie turns his face into Stan’s hair, just for a moment. He closes his eyes and inhales and exhales, nice and slow.

“Fuck,” Richie agrees. Stan peels himself off of them, then gets off the bed, dragging Richie by the hand into the bathroom across the hall to scrub him down. Richie just laughs as Stan runs the washcloth over his skin, warm with water from the sink.

They don’t talk about anything, for a little bit. Stan instructs him, tells him to turn this way, to lift his arm, to spread his legs, and Richie does. It’s not until they’re clean, dry, and back in Richie’s room with the door shut and firmly locked before Stan says, “I— Do you want me to stay here or go back to my room?”

“You have a bed, man,” Richie says. His face goes hot. “Not that I— It’s not that I don’t want you here, I just—”

“No, that’s much better,” Stan says. “That’s what I wanted to do.”

Richie smiles, then leans over to tap on the wall they share. Stan smiles back at him before he starts to gather his clothes.

“So, what is this?” Richie asks, flopping onto his back on his bed, still naked. There’s definitely something cool and damp under him on his sheets; he’s not sure what it is, sweat or cum, but he doesn’t give enough of a shit to move away from it. Instead, he stretches, then grabs his sheet and tugs it up so it’s most of the way to his waist. If he can’t have modesty post-hookup, when can he?

“I think we could just do friends with benefits,” Stan says. Richie laughs. “I’m serious.”

“I know,” Richie says. “You’ve got your serious little face on. I’m laughing because that’s such a ridiculous thing to say to another human person outside an episode of  _ Friends.” _

“You are  _ constantly  _ turning my life into terrible episodes of  _ Friends,”  _ Stan grumbles, straightening out his hair in Richie’s mirror. He turns to him. “Presentable enough?”

“To go from my room to your room, in our shared apartment, at nighttime?” Richie asks. “Yeah, you’re all set, Lon Chaney, they’ll never know it’s you.”

“Shut up, Richie,” Stan tells him. He sighs, then turns to look at Richie instead of just side-eyeing him in the mirror. “I’m sorry. I feel weird.”

“Why?” Richie asks, stupid grin on his face. He folds his arms behind his head, interlocked hands supporting his skull when he leans back into his palms. “Because you just fucked your childhood best buddy into his fourteen-year-old mattress?”

Stan frowns, then says, “Your mattress is  _ fourteen  _ years old. Eddie’s gonna kick your  _ ass.” _

“Eddie’s never gonna see this mattress,” Richie says wistfully. He pats the edge of the damp spot and sighs, dramatic now. It’s easier than being serious. “Just me, you, and ol’ Reliable.”

Stan rolls his eyes again, but then he sits on the edge of the bed, right beside Richie. He picks at a hangnail, then says, to his hands, “If you’re not okay with it, I get it. It’s alright if it’s weird. I just thought it’d be worth seeing if I felt better just— just—” Stan makes a frustrated motion with his hands. “Do you know what I’m saying, Richie?”

“Yeah,” Richie tells him. He holds out his arm, and Stan goes to him, dropping his head on Richie’s chest and letting Richie’s arm curl around his back to hold him in place against him. He kisses the top of Stan’s head.

“Are you sure it’s okay?” Stan asks.

“What else am I doing?” Richie responds. “It’s like you said, man. Eddie’s got Isaac. And I know Eddie’s the only one for me, so. I’m not really looking for a relationship.”

“Okay,” Stan says. After a beat, he lifts his head to look up at Richie again. “You deserve to be loved, Richie. Even if it’s not by Eddie. You should put yourself out there.”

“Tried and failed,” Richie reminds him. “I’m not bothering right now, it’s just not worth it. Why waste my time? I could just be hanging out with you guys.”

Stan sighs, then leans in to kiss the corner of Richie’s mouth before he stands again. He dusts off the front of his sweater, straightening it out. When he looks at Richie again, he looks stern. Richie grins at him, lopsided and show-cheery again.

“Can I—” Stan says, then stops. “Wanna get coffee after I get out of work tomorrow?”

Richie’s grin widens, and he nods. “Yeah. I’d love it.”

Stan smiles a little, hand on the doorknob. After a beat, he nods, then unlocks and opens the door. Still, though, he hovers. “You’re  _ sure  _ you’re okay?”

“Okay,  _ listen,”  _ Richie says, sitting up more fully and leaning forward so his hands fall in his lap. “I love you so much, Stan. You’re my best friend. Nothing’s ever gonna change that.” Richie points to the window and says, “If your clone smashed through the glass  _ right now  _ and stabbed me in the face, I’d still love you more than anything on this planet. I mean it.”

Stan’s face goes all pink again. He nods. “Thank you, Richie.”

“Anytime, Stan,” Richie says. He finds he really  _ does  _ mean it, all of it.

It doesn’t make it any less difficult for Stan to leave. It doesn’t make it hurt any less when he flips the lights off and lays alone in the darkness and silence, watching his lava lamp slowly drift in an ambient haze of pink as his eyes blur. He sniffles, then buries his face in his pillow, ignoring his phone when it vibrates on the nightstand.

* * *

It becomes a habit.

“It’s my new hobby,” Richie jokingly tells Stan one night, when he’s on his knees in front of him. Stan’s got his head back against his closet door, his shirt unbuttoned at the collar, sweat glistening in the hollow beneath his throat.

“Don’t call casual sex a hobby,” Stan says. “You’re going to get yourself put in a facility.”

“A man needs ways to fill his time,” Richie reminds him. “You know, they say ten thousand hours of something makes you an expert.”

“Does a million hours make you insufferable?” Stan asks. “Because the twenty-plus years you’ve spent talking have m—  _ Motherfucker,  _ Richie,  _ fuck—” _

Richie licks around the head of Stan’s cock in his mouth and smiles, just a little, before he works a little bit harder on Stan’s blowjob.

It becomes more than a habit.

It becomes pretty much the only thing that helps Richie get through the day, sometimes. He sees Eddie constantly, and so he’s constantly ripping off the bandaid and probing the wound of unrequited love underneath. That means he constantly needs to re-bandage the wound, and that’s when he texts Stan.

The situation evolves, because of  _ course  _ it does. It  _ has  _ to. It doesn’t evolve in a sitcom-way, though, or a romcom sort of way, where Richie and Stan both realize they were actually in love with each other the entire time. If anything, the experience highlights both how much he loves Stan and how much they would never work together as partners in an actual relationship.

They make small concessions, though. Richie lets Stan wax poetic about how much he loves eating pussy. Stan lets Richie be the little spoon and fall asleep in his arms sometimes before he slips back to his room. It’s balanced, like the rest of their friendship. It clicks into place, makes perfect sense. Richie can’t see himself explaining it to anyone else, but he’s not sure anyone else would understand, so he keeps it to himself. He tells most of his secrets to Stan first, anyways, and this time Stan is in on the secret, so it makes it that much easier to keep it to himself.

Their routine shifts. After Stan gets out of work, the two of them will grab dinner, they’ll confide in each other all their deepest, darkest emotions, and then they’ll get home and fuck. Afterwards, they’ll usually hang out while Richie scribbles sets in his notebooks and Stan catches up on his HBO dramas, eating dessert together. Mike and Bill will usually join them, and they’ll all hang out together, happy as clams. Sometimes Richie will blow Stan before bed, sometimes not. The next day, Richie wakes up, goes to work at the coffee shop, and waits for Stan to get off work again.

Sometimes, he’ll spend time with Bill, or Mike. Sometimes Ben and Bev text to hang out, but they’re getting ready for their wedding and Richie understands they don’t have as much time to spend with him right now. Or anymore, ever, actually. The same goes for Bill and Mike, because their relationship is getting more serious.

Patty’s relationship with Reed starts getting more serious, too. During their emotional talks, each of which leave Richie feeling wrung out with how much he has confided in Stan and how much Stan has confessed to him, Richie finds out, in detail, exactly  _ how  _ serious. Tragically, this is because  _ Patty  _ has been telling  _ Stan  _ everything about her relationship with Reed.

“To make you jealous,” Richie keeps insisting. Stan just shakes his head every time and blows him off, but Richie’s pretty sure he’s right. He’s seen Patty and Reed spending time together; he even saw them making out a party once, and Patty doesn’t even have a  _ crush  _ on the guy. She doesn’t seem committed to him at all; she spends more time staring after Stan, enamored with his every motion and hanging off his every word, than she does even  _ talking  _ to Reed. Richie’s not blind. He  _ sees  _ this.

Stan, however, is either deeply concussed or emotionally repressed, because he insists he and Patty are just really good friends. He  _ also  _ insists to Richie that they’re not as friendly anymore, not since Reed showed up. It makes Stan cry, the first time he says he realizes it. Richie still thinks he’s misreading the situation, but that doesn’t stop him from holding Stan on his bed while he cries for half an hour.

The kicker is that Stan had been reasonably sure, before, that Patty was interested in him, but that’s not the case anymore. One step forward becomes two steps back; Stan’s now ready to act, but Patty’s trying to move on  _ and _ doesn’t even know how Stan’s responding to his. She has no idea how miserable he is, because he hides his fucking feelings the second he walks out of their apartment.

“Maybe it’s because of that shitty boyfriend she had,” Richie points out one day. Stan is neatly eating around the edges of his mint chocolate chip cup so the sides won’t melt over onto his hands. “Or that dumbass girlfriend who keyed her car?”

“I’m not like them, though,” Stan says, a furrow to his brow when he digs his little wooden spoon into the middle of his ice cream. “She knows that.”

“But she might be in a rough place right now,” Richie says. “Looking for a rebound, which you are  _ not,  _ my friend. Maybe she’s getting out all her hot girl energy.”

“What the  _ fuck  _ is hot girl energy?” Stan asks, so venomous that Richie chokes on a laugh, along with a mouthful of coconut ice cream.

“If you have to ask, you don’t have it,” Richie tells Stan mournfully. Stan shoves a napkin in his mouth as he laughs.

For all that Richie likes to give advice and tease Stan about the situation with Patty, he’s miserable about the situation with Eddie. In that case, he prefers not to think about it, talk about it, or have it referred to specifically or in vague references, if possible.

Richie’s been in love with Eddie for so long, pining after him with the type of yearning typically reserved for the old lesbian poets, that there’s rarely any new words to say about it. Stan still listens. He still comforts Richie, like Richie comforts Stan; he still sits up at night and has these emotional talks with him, even though Richie knows the emotions he’s working through aren’t  _ going  _ anywhere. Eddie and Isaac have been together for a  _ year. _

A  _ year,  _ and counting; they’re on their way to a year and a half, now, and soon it’ll be two years, and then one of them will propose and they’ll get married and Richie will die alone, a spinster in an attic, or one of these people who lives in the walls of stately old mansions, living off the scraps left behind by the children. He tells Stan this, and Stan just hugs him and tells him he’s a dumbass. Richie knows.

The worst part of all of it is, Isaac’s really not even that great. Eddie spends a shitload of time with him — which makes sense, considering they’re d— that they’re  _ dating _ — but he doesn’t seem to overly love that time.

Richie knows he shouldn’t compare, but, when they hang out together, alone or in a larger group, Eddie laughs so  _ much.  _ They get in arguments, and they lob jokes at each other, and they get worked up. They tackle each other and goof around and challenge one another. Isaac and Eddie don’t do  _ any  _ of that. It’s just… lackluster.

“No spark,” Stan comments one night, reading from a novel with his reading glasses at the end of his nose. Richie’s sprawled out on the floor near his feet, trying to stay in the lines on a marker paint-by-numbers he bought at the Dollar Tree.

“What?” Richie asks, carefully coloring in a wave behind a lighthouse.

“They have no spark,” Stan repeats. “There’s no passion. They don’t care about each other enough.”

“We don’t know what they’re like when they’re alone,” Richie grumbles. Stan shrugs, looking back down at his book, but Richie seethes for another ten minutes before Stan has to make him get in bed and strip down to relax for a second.

Eddie spends more and more time with Isaac by the day. Richie feels like he barely sees him, anymore. It hurts, that Eddie doesn’t want to see him as much anymore, if it all. It also sucks to hang out with him right now, though, because Eddie tells him things about his sex life, and his relationship, and about  _ Isaac,  _ and hearing the words coming directly out of Eddie’s mouth always make Richie feel at least a little nauseous.

Richie knows that Eddie and Isaac’s sex life is okay, but not amazing. He knows Isaac is alright at cooking, but not amazing. He’s outspoken to the point of being obnoxious and loud to the point of inducing headaches, and Eddie constantly seems mortified by things he does and says, but they’re still together.

In spite of all of this, Richie’s sure it’s pretty serious. He knows they say  _ I love you  _ to each other. He’s known since last September 7th, when he heard Eddie whisper it to Isaac over a FaceTime call in his kitchen. He has nightmares about that day at least once a week still; it hurts, to see it all. It  _ hurts.  _ It’s even  _ worse,  _ that Eddie’s spending less time with Richie because of it all; and, cherry on top of all of this  _ shit,  _ Eddie’s completely oblivious to each and every one of these feelings.

Sometimes, Richie feels like he can’t shut up, but with Eddie, he can’t seem to start talking. There’s not much to say, he reminds himself; Eddie is with Isaac. He can’t tell him how he feels. It doesn’t serve anybody. All it will do is make Eddie feel guilty and make him feel like a homewrecker, their friendship will dissolve, their entire friend  _ group  _ will fracture, and Richie’s life will be ruined, he  _ knows  _ it.

So, he doesn’t say anything at all. Not to Eddie, not to Patty. Not to anybody but Stan, who knows every single word of it. The honest truth, every time, because Stan gives him that, and because they owe each other that much.

* * *

As it turns out, Richie doesn’t need to use words.

At least, not to tell their friends about what’s going on between him and Stan. If it can even be considered anything; they’re mostly just paired off because they’re the last ones not in relationships, so they’d been spending a lot of time together recently anyways. All it is, is some added fucking, and Richie thinks it’s a welcome addition. Stan could use some unwinding, needs a way to blow off some extra physical steam. This works well for them both, Richie thinks.

When Bill signs his first contract for a sophomore novel, it’s the perfect time for them to have a party in their apartment, and they invite pretty much everybody Bill knows and is willing to do a keg stand around — which, to repeat, is pretty much everybody Bill knows. The party’s fun, and hectic, and it goes on for a  _ while,  _ and—

And Patty and Eddie are there, and Reed and Isaac are there. Richie catches Eddie and Isaac leaning together in the kitchen, speaking softly while Isaac winds his arm around Eddie’s waist. Stan catches Patty and Reed, both blowing past tipsy into drunk, pushing their way into the bathroom. Richie hopes it’s just to make out, but the look on Stan’s face assures him it doesn’t matter regardless. They may as well have dropped to the floor and fucked in front of him; he looks fucking  _ crushed. _

Richie goes to Stan like he’s pulled by a magnet. He wants to make him feel better, so he just walks until his hand is wrapping around Stan’s wrist.

“Wanna go back to my room?” Richie asks, voice low under the music. Stan nods jerkily, and Richie leads him quick. They fight their way through the throngs of people, some of whom  _ Richie  _ doesn’t even know. Richie makes eye contact with Eddie once on their way to the back hallway, but he breaks it as fast as he can; he doesn’t need Eddie following him, not now. He just needs one place he feels wanted; Eddie can’t break that bubble, too. He  _ can’t. _

With Richie’s bedroom door closed, it’s easy for them both, tipsy and heartbroken and emotional and  _ raw,  _ to fall into bed. Stan sits up on Richie’s hips, stripping his sweater and then his shirt off over his head in one fluid motion. They’ve been doing this for a little while; it’s old hat, now.

He tosses his clothes aside, then makes quick work of Richie’s shirt, his pants, his underwear, undressing all the vital parts of him until he can slick up his cock and work Richie’s already-loose hole back open. They’d fucked before the party, hoping it would take the edge off, but even Richie hadn’t expected a full-on makeout from Patty and Reed. He thinks Stan can be forgiven for being a little worked up.

Stan yanks Richie onto his hands and knees, this time, then knocks him down onto his elbows. Richie buries his face in the pillow Stan places under his head for him to muffle his voice when Stan pushes into him. Stan bottoms out in one move, smooth and easy; he stills, then sighs. After a beat, he starts fucking Richie in earnest. One of his hands wraps up in Richie’s hair, folding over him, his other hand gripping Richie’s hip as he fucks into him. His grip in his hair tightens, and Richie has to lift his head, pulled by his hold.

Of  _ course  _ it’s then that their door opens and Eddie is standing on the other side. He makes eye contact with Richie, the both of them frozen for a long, horrifying moment. Then, Eddie’s eyes flick up to meet Stan’s, presumably, and Richie finally shouts, “Fucking  _ shit,  _ Eddie, shut the fucking  _ door—” _

“What the—” someone else’s voice calls, and Stan scrambles to pull out of Richie and get clothes on as fast as he can, but there’s nowhere near enough time before Patty appears over Eddie’s shoulder. She looks just as mortified before her face crumples and she runs away.

“Patty, wait!” Stan exclaims. He yanks his pants back up and grabs his shirt before sprinting out of the room after her, tugging his arms through the sleeves. Richie sits up, feeling like he’s in a particularly heinous dream as he and Eddie stare at each other. He’s still partially undressed, dick and ass still out; he feels like a fucked-up Winnie the Pooh.

“I— Can you leave, please?” Richie finally manages to get out. Eddie doesn’t move. “Eddie,  _ please.” _

Richie’s voice breaks, and that seems to snap Eddie out of it. He nods once, then slams the door shut. Richie staggers to his feet, abandoning his pants and pulling his underwear back up so he doesn’t trip on his way to locking his door.

He collapses in his bed, hands over his face. The party’s still going heavy outside, but all he can hear is muffled voices and the faint thumping of bass through speakers. He can’t even make out the rest of the instruments in the songs that play, and he’s the one who made the playlists.

All that silence, though, means he hears it when Stan’s bedroom door slams open and shut. It opens again, though, interestingly enough, and then Richie hears slightly-muffled shouting. He makes out the voices of Eddie and Stan, getting clearer and clearer the closer they get to the shared wall.

“—Exactly, you’re  _ not  _ thinking,” Eddie spits, when Richie can finally make out entire words that they’re saying. “You’re just— You’re just doing whatever makes you feel good, and fuck everybody else.”

“Eddie, stop it,” Stan says, firm. “You don’t know what you’re talking about and you’re just going to piss me off even more.”

“Good!” Eddie exclaims. “Get pissed off, fucking— Tell me why you’re doing this—”

“I don’t need to explain myself to you,” Stan snaps. “You’ve barely even been around lately, I’m not surprised you’re only just finding out tonight.”

“Hey, it is  _ not  _ my fault that you and Richie decided to keep this a secret from me,” Eddie shoots right back. Richie listens closer, wrapped around his pillow.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset about this,” Stan replies. “Not that I need to clarify the boundaries of our relationship to you, Eddie, but we’re strictly doing this as friends with benefits—”

“But is  _ Richie _ okay with that?” Eddie interrupts him to ask harshly. Richie frowns; Stan’s quiet, so he can only imagine that he’s confused by that turn, too.

“What do you— Of course he’s okay with it,” Stan replies. “I wouldn’t do something he wasn’t okay with. I don’t know what you think of me—”

“No, no, that’s not what I—” Eddie says, then groans loudly in frustration. “Stan, I really think— I think Richie has feelings for you. I— I think he’s in love with you.”

Stan laughs. Just once, and Richie can tell it’s startled out of him. He almost wants to laugh, too; Eddie’s so horrifyingly off-base and yet so,  _ so  _ close to the  _ real  _ truth.

“No, I don’t think he is,” Stan replies.

“Listen to me,” Eddie says sharply. “He spends most of his time with  _ you.  _ He’s— He talks about things you’ve been doing together whenever I see him, and you’re tagged in all his posts. He really likes you, Stan, so taking advantage of him like this is only going to end up in Richie getting hurt, and I know we—”

“Whoa, fuck,  _ excuse  _ me, did you say I’m taking advantage of him?” Stan asks. “Because I am  _ not  _ fucking taking advantage of him. We decided to do this  _ together,  _ which you’d know if you  _ asked,  _ Eddie.”

“I shouldn’t  _ have  _ to ask—”

“Well, you do,” Stan interrupts him. “You want to know why Richie spends most of his time with me?”

“Stan,” Richie whispers, momentarily terrified that Stan’s going to say something stupid. “Don’t—”

“It’s because  _ you’re  _ never around,” Stan says. Richie exhales as he continues, “You’re his best friend and you’ve been spending less and less time with him lately, so what’s he supposed to do? Just hang around and wait for you?”

“That’s not fair,” Eddie spits. “I’m—”

“You’re seeing someone, yeah,” Stan says. “I  _ know  _ you are. So’s Bill, so’s Mike. So’s— Patty is, too. Ben and Bev, and we see  _ them.” _

They’re both quiet, for a long moment. Then, Eddie says, “It’s not the same.”

“It is,” Stan replies. “You’re the one making it weird, Eddie.”

“You don’t know—”

“I don’t need to,” Stan tells him. “I don’t know what it is you’re dealing with, Eddie, but you can’t get mad at  _ me  _ for talking to Richie when you’re  _ never  _ around anymore. How would you even really know how he’s doing or what he’s feeling right now? Have you asked him? Has he told you  _ anything?  _ Or are you just guessing?”

They’re both silent again.

Then, Eddie quietly says, “Fuck you, Stan.”

“Be mad at me if you want,” Stan replies. “I don’t give a shit. You’ve been a bad friend.”

They’re quiet. Richie listens hard; the first sound he hears is after a minute, and it’s the sound of Stan’s desk chair creaking.

“I didn’t mean that quite so extremely,” Stan says. Richie huffs a laugh, his heart pounding in his chest just listening to this. “You’re not a bad friend. I just mean— You know how Richie is.”

“Yeah,” Eddie replies. Richie frowns.

“You can’t just abandon him,” Stan continues, and,  _ ah.  _ He feels his whole face burn hot; he feels absurdly seen, and he’s not certain he likes it, but he’s also not sure that he  _ doesn’t.  _ “He doesn’t—”

“I  _ know,”  _ Eddie snaps.

“I didn’t mean that you shouldn’t spend time with Isaac,” Stan says. “You’re allowed to spend as much time with your boyfriend as you want. It’s your relationship and your life.”

“But?” Eddie asks. Richie smiles slightly, burying his face in his pillow.

“But you should also realize that Richie’s left out of that,” Stan tells him. “You two were attached at the hip for your whole lives, and now he barely sees you. And there’s no Isaac for  _ him _ to fill  _ his _ time with.”

“I thought it would be easier this way,” Eddie says. “But it’s not.”

Richie’s not entirely sure what that means, but there’s no time to dwell; Stan’s already saying, “No, it’s not. But if you—”

“I’m not,” Eddie cuts him off. “There’s nothing— I don’t even know why I was avoiding him. If I even  _ was _ avoiding hi— Alright, fine,  _ stop,  _ I was, I  _ am,  _ I just—” Eddie sighs, frustrated and loud. When he talks again, his voice is softer; Richie has to strain to hear it over the bass-thumps of music outside his door. “I miss him, Stan.”

“I know,” Stan replies. “You can fix that, though. I have to— I have to call Patty and see where she went, I have to talk to her, but— I don’t think I heard Richie’s door open, so he’s probably still in his room. You can go talk to him—”

That’s all Richie hears, because that’s when he hisses,  _ “Shit,”  _ and starts scrambling into any clothes he can find as fast as he can. He ends up in his boxers and Stan’s sweater before there’s a tentative knock on his door.

“Richie?” Eddie’s voice calls. “You still in there?”

Richie hesitates. For a moment, he considers just being silent and pretending he left, or that he fell asleep, maybe. Then, Eddie will leave, and they never have to talk about this again.

_ Or you’ll never talk again at all,  _ Richie’s brain supplies unhelpfully. Richie sighs, then says, loudly, “Yeah.”

There’s a beat. Then, “Can I come in?”

“Why?”

Eddie laughs humorlessly. “I just want to talk.”

Richie stares at the doorknob. He feels distantly like, if he touches it, it’s going to burn him. He touches it anyways, unlocking it and twisting it open to find Eddie on the other side.

His face is blotched red, his hair’s all over the place, and he looks jittery, hands shaking when Richie steps back to let him in. He comes into the room like a storm, all noise and movement as he buzzes through.

“I’m  _ so  _ sorry, I should’ve knocked,” Eddie rushes to tell him. “And I— I want to tell you it’s none of my business who you decide you want to date and that I’ve been a really shitty friend lately and I’m sorry I haven’t been around for you to tell me things so I don’t find them out like  _ this.  _ I’m  _ sorry.” _

Richie blinks at him, then rubs his eye under his glasses as he shuts his bedroom door. “Eds, it’s fine—”

“It’s  _ not  _ fine,” Eddie cuts him off. He starts pacing, back and forth across Richie’s room, a sparking ball of nervous energy. “I’ve essentially just— dropped off the face of the Earth and I spend every day with Isaac just because I don’t know how to not— Uhh,” he says, then stops. With a hard exhale, he continues, “I just mean that I’m sorry. And I didn’t want to say the— Is that Stan’s sweater?”

It takes Richie a second to process that the end of that was actually a question  _ for  _ him. He looks down, tugging self-consciously at the hem. Stan’s taller than Eddie, but not as tall as Richie or as wide as him by far; the sweater doesn’t fit him great.

“Yeah, sorry,” Richie says. “I just— grabbed what I saw.”

Eddie doesn’t reply. He just keeps staring at the sweater.

“Sorry,” Richie repeats. Eddie’s eyes dart up to meet his.

“Wanna go see a movie tomorrow?” Eddie asks.

“Which movie?”

“Any movie,” Eddie tells him. “Whichever one you want. I’ll let you put Reese’s Pieces in my popcorn.”

Richie frowns at him, even as his pulse starts speeding up again, foolishly optimistic even after everything. “Did Stan tell you I’m dying or something?”

_ “No,”  _ Eddie snaps, scowling, and  _ there’s  _ the Eddie that Richie knows. “I just fucking miss you. I want to hang out, is that a crime? Are we not allowed to hang out anymore?”

“I don’t know,” Richie says, heart thumping. “I wanted to ask you that, actually. I guess.”

The two of them make hard eye contact, then. Richie fights back the urge to apologize immediately in the face of Eddie’s face going solid red, now.

“I’m really sorry,” Eddie ends up saying. He shakes his head, then looks away, wiping at his face with the ends of his sleeves. Richie frowns again, because it takes a  _ lot  _ to make Eddie cry.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that,” Richie says, giving in to the urge. Eddie huffs a wet laugh, unamused.

“Why not? You’re right,” Eddie replies. “I just— I thought— I don’t know. I don’t know what I thought.” He looks back to Richie and says, “I fucked up. I miss you a lot, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have— I shouldn’t have done that. I fucked up.”

Richie lets himself smile a little bit. “I could’ve fought harder.”

“Don’t martyr yourself,” Eddie complains. “Are there any good movies playing? Because if you take me to some shitty comedy and I find out later that there was a horror movie playing, I’m going to absolutely kick your  _ ass.” _

Richie laughs as his phone buzzes on his bed. He goes to grab it, but he sees the notification before he’s even got it in his hand: a text from Stan, and the preview says,  _ Sorry to say but we’re going to have to stop with…  _ He furrows his brow, lifting his phone.

“What’s wrong?” Eddie asks. Richie unlocks his phone and opens the text.

With a grin, Richie reads aloud, “‘Sorry to say but we’re going to have to stop with the FWB thing.’” Richie looks to Eddie and says, “Friends with benefits.”

“Thanks,” Eddie says flatly. “Keep going.”

“‘Sorry to say but we’re going to have to stop with the FWB thing,’” Richie repeats before continuing, “‘I called Patty and she’d only gotten a block away, I explained and she told me she was JEALOUS,’ that’s in all caps, ‘and that she realized she wants to be with me. We’re working things out now; I’ll—’ yes, that was a semicolon, stop interrupting— “‘I’ll update you in the morning.’”

Eddie doesn’t say anything, when Richie stops, even though he’d spent the entire text trying to lean up and read the message over Richie’s shoulder. Richie locks his phone, after a beat, and tosses it back down.

“How about a movie now?” Richie asks. Eddie looks to him, his brows furrowed; his eyes search for something in Richie’s face. Whatever he finds gives him an answer, and he nods.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll grab my jacket,” Eddie says. When he turns to leave, he hesitates, just for a moment, before adding, “Richie, I really am sorry. It’s not your fault. It’s mine.”

“Are you giving me the  _ it’s not you, it’s me?”  _ Richie asks. “That’s only for people you’re breaking up with, compadre.”

The air is thick and silent again before Eddie huffs a laugh and says, “Yeah.”

He leaves Richie’s room like a crack of lightning; Richie can almost smell the ozone. It takes him a beat to move, but the first thing he does is take Stan’s sweater off and cram it under his bed. After a thought, he pulls it back out, folds it, then slides it back into place.

When Eddie comes back with his jacket on, Richie’s haphazardly dressed and tugging his sneakers back on, and they go to the movies together, late that night, just like that.

* * *

Things start looking up from there, a little bit.

For one thing, Richie’s got a new contender for new best friend, after the Losers, in Patricia Blum. After she breaks up with Reed and starts dating Stan, she starts hanging around a  _ lot,  _ and Richie actually  _ loves  _ her.

Getting to know Patty is a genuine  _ gift. _ He’d thought before she was fine before, a normal girl, nice but kind of standoffish; now he knows that what he considered “kind but distant” was Patty’s jealous, silent, “I hate you from afar” vibe, which is kind of cute more than anything, in hindsight.

She apologizes profusely for all of it, but Richie just waves her off. He likes her a lot, and if he had to lose Stan to anybody, he’s glad it’s someone like her.

Plus, now he gets to hang out with  _ both  _ of them. They spend a bunch of their time alone, which Richie expected; they also invite him out every other day or so, which Richie had not expected at  _ all.  _ He suspects that Stan’s nervous of completely abandoning him, but Richie’s not afraid of that. He knows Stan wouldn’t. Anyways, he likes Patty; he doesn’t mind third-wheeling them now and then.

Richie’s genuinely happy for Stan. He is. He doesn’t mind that their little arrangement is off, obviously, because in light of the shift in situation, that’s no longer cool. Stan had even seemed a little reluctant to do it, when they discussed it and came to the decision. It would never have been anything else, Richie knows, but… Maybe. In some other life. He’s not sure why Stan was reluctant, anyways; probably because he’s leaving Richie all alone, so. Richie just brushes it off.

He spends a lot of time with them in their living room, he goes on outings with them, he makes dinner with them. Sometimes the other Losers join in, Mike and Bill most often. Eddie even drops by, usually sans-Isaac but sometimes with him in tow, and they can all have fun together, for a while. The only thing Eddie seems to dislike is the comments Richie and Patty make about how good Stan is in bed which, while true, seems to disgruntle Eddie. He’s probably pissed that he has to think about two of his childhood friends having sex, but that’s pretty much  _ all  _ the Losers by now. Richie refuses to feel bad about that.

In all of this, honestly, not  _ once _ does Richie feel unwanted or unloved by Stan and Patty. Sometimes he wishes he could just move on from Eddie and move in with  _ them. _

When Richie takes Patty aside one day and asks her if this is all okay, she hugs him and kisses him on the cheek.

“You’re my friend,” she tells him. “I know this is hard for you. I’m here for you.”

Right, yes, and he told her about Eddie. He figured it would help her believe the friends with benefits thing more, and he was right. Not only that, but she’s both sympathetic and helpful; Richie likes having a new ear to bend and new advice to ignore over what to do about the whole Eddie situation. Patty’s focused on helping him get over his feelings; Richie’s long since accepted there’s no getting over what he feels for Eddie.

Regardless, though, he appreciates the company  _ and  _ the attention, especially now. Ben and Bev are getting closer to getting engaged; Mike and Bill have got a serious, steady thing going; Eddie and Isaac are… what they are, and Richie’s mind glosses over them for self-preservation reasons; and, now, Stan has Patty, the love of his life, the girl he’s been in love with for a while, sure. But he hasn’t been in love with her his  _ entire life. _

Which is the kicker of it all. This all comes just as Eddie starts putting more effort into actually spending time with him again. He doesn’t bother with any more apologies after that first night, since Richie gets flustered and embarrassed every time he brings it up, but Richie can feel it in the way he acts. If he hadn’t forgiven him long before, he’d forgive him then. He knows, logically, that Eddie would never consciously do anything to hurt him; he tries to remind himself the reason this hurts  _ so  _ badly is because he’s in love with Eddie, and that that’s not Eddie’s fault  _ nor  _ his problem.

They spend more time together as early fall becomes a crisp fall-winter hybrid; by the time winter itself is finally rolling around, snow near-constantly on the ground, in mid-December, they’re like they used to be all over again. It’s like nothing ever happened.

Well, with one small exception.

Isaac clearly is  _ not  _ comfortable with them getting close again.

Richie’s not sure why. Maybe Isaac has a sixth sense for when people are in love with his serious long-term boyfriend or something, which would be entirely valid, but it’s not like Richie’s trying to  _ do  _ anything. He’s not  _ pursuing  _ Eddie. There’s nothing for him  _ to  _ do; he can’t move on, and he can’t be with him, so he just have to live in this purgatory. Honestly, Isaac should be grateful Richie’s biting the bullet on this one.

Isaac never says anything, though. Richie’s not sure what he’d do if he did confront him; he just hopes that’ll never happen. Now and then, Isaac will ask for his advice for where to take Eddie on a date, what to make him for dinner; it hurts, and it sucks, but Richie wants Eddie to be happy, so he answers the questions without a fuss. He’s just hoping it means Isaac will never push and ask the question Richie dreads most:  _ Why are you doing this? _

Which is exactly why his blood runs cold when Isaac calls Eddie’s phone and Eddie answers it, frowns, and says, “He wants to talk to  _ you,”  _ right before Christmas.

He tries to keep his hands from shaking as he answers the phone with, “Hey, man, what’s up? Stuck in a well?”

Eddie smacks him in the chest, but Richie doesn’t wince. Making the joke is the only thing that stopped him from saying,  _ “Please don’t talk to me.” _

“No, I actually had a question for you,” Isaac says. “Do you mind going in another room? Where Ed can’t hear you.”

For some reason, Isaac saying  _ Ed  _ makes Richie’s skin crawl. He still makes himself smile for Eddie’s benefit, though, as he says, “Sure thing.” He covers the phone, then says, “I’m gonna be in your room, Eds, be right back.”

Eddie furrows his brow, but Richie leaves before he can be stopped. He even goes so far as to lock Eddie’s door with one trembling hand before he brings the phone up to his ear.

“What’s up?” he asks, possibly more afraid than he’s ever been in his life.

“I need your help,” Isaac says, completely unprecedented. Richie feels his face scrunch up.

“My  _ help?”  _ Richie asks, incredulous. “You need my  _ help?  _ Help with  _ what?” _

“You’ve known Ed a long time, right?” Isaac asks. Richie’s blood boils.

“Yeah,” he says. “Since we were little kids.”

“So you know him really well,” Isaac continues. One thing Richie doesn’t like about him: he has a tendency to beat around the bush. Eddie’s much more direct, or at least prefers a more direct approach, Richie knows.

“I do,” Richie says.

“So you can help me pick out a Christmas gift for him,” Isaac continues. Richie’s heart feels like it goes cold and falls, heavy like ice, into the pit of his stomach.

“I guess so,” Richie replies. He sits down on the edge of Eddie’s bed; on his nightstand, he’s got three framed photos. One’s of all seven of the Losers at the beach together; one is Richie and Eddie, age four, covered in mud; and the third is Eddie and Isaac, hands together, Eddie’s face tipped up to smile at Isaac. Isaac’s smiling back. He clearly loves Eddie.

“Any ideas?” Isaac asks. Richie keeps staring at the picture of the two of them and debates giving Isaac a horrible idea for something Eddie would hate. “I’m really bad at picking stuff out for him. He doesn’t say it, but I can tell, he’s always bummed out.”

_ Because you don’t know him,  _ Richie doesn’t say. He looks at the picture another beat.

“Yeah,” Richie says. “I’ve got a couple ideas.”

He doesn’t  _ want  _ to, but Eddie deserves to be happy. The guy clearly cares about him, because he wants to give him something he’ll like. Eddie’s smiling in the picture with him like he’s happy. Eddie  _ should  _ be happy. He should be happy with a decent guy, even if that guy isn’t Richie.

“I actually have a quick one I wanted to run past you,” Isaac says. “I was thinking of maybe getting a ring and proposing to him for Christmas. What do you think?”

Richie’s hands go cold, then sweaty, then  _ numb,  _ within  _ seconds.  _ He thinks his entire brain whites out, in that instant. His heart goes so fast it hurts.

“You still there?” Isaac asks. Richie can’t even begin to process the idea of somebody asking Eddie to marry them, of seeing Eddie get  _ married— _

He almost cries. He doesn’t, but he keeps it together just long enough to choke out, “Yeah, that sounds— Sounds so great, I’m s— I’m— Sorry, Eddie’s getting another call, I’m giving him the phone back,” and hang up. He presses the phone to his forehead and lets the sob come out before he crams it all back down.

When he flies out of Eddie’s room, he can barely even see. Everything’s just a hazy blur as he shoves Eddie’s phone back into his hands, tells him he’s not feeling well, and runs out of his place without even grabbing his coat. He can hear Eddie calling his name behind him, but he doesn’t stop. He doesn’t even slow down. If anything, he speeds  _ up,  _ running until he’s sprinting, a stitch in his side, lungs burning, all the way back to his apartment.

He crashes through the front door, making Patty yelp and Stan jump, reaching for the glass he has on the end table in the living room like he’s going to hurl it at Richie. Mike sticks his head around the corner from the kitchen, reading glasses in place, brow furrowed.

“What’s going on?” he calls. Richie just leaves the door open behind himself and takes two steps. Stan and Patty both stand up; after a beat, Stan makes his way around the sofa.

“Richie?” Stan asks, hesitantly. “What happened?”

Richie shakes his head. He looks to Stan. The moment they make eye contact, another sob bursts out of him, and Stan rushes forward, catching him before he can fall over. He guides Richie down to the floor, and then holds him close, arms coming tight around him. Mike’s hand lands on his back, and he can feel Patty hugging him from behind. Smaller hands than Mike’s touch his face; when he’s tipped up, Bill’s cupping his cheeks.

“Hey, Rich, what’s going on?” Bill asks. “You’ve gotta tell us so we can help you, okay? Are you hurt? Are you okay?”

Richie shakes his head, then says, “He’s getting married.”

“Oh, no,” Patty says softly.

“Who?” Bill asks. Stan smacks him.  _ “What?” _

“I was at Eddie’s and Isaac called and said he wanted to talk to  me,”  Richie explains, all in a wet rush of words. He doesn’t think he can do it twice. He buries his face in Stan’s chest again as he says, “He asked me what he should get Eddie for Christmas and then suggested— He said he’s getting him a ring and he’s going to propose for Christmas and I— I didn’t— I said it sounded good, I— I—”

“Shush, shh, it’s okay,” Patty quiets him, stroking his hair back. He hears the door click shut before Bill’s back in front of him again.

“It’s going to be okay,” Bill says. He says that a lot, but there’s not really anything any of them can  _ do.  _ It’s going to be okay because it  _ has  _ to be, and it will be for  _ them,  _ but things are really never going to be okay for Richie again, not  _ actually,  _ because  _ this  _ will always be hovering above him. He can’t love Eddie; Eddie’s married to someone else; Eddie  _ doesn’t love him. _

“What do I do?” Richie asks tearfully. “He’s going to say yes.”

“You don’t know that,” Mike hurries to assure him. “He might say no, and then you can ask why and there’s— The door’s open! You’re in!”

_ “Mike,”  _ Bill hisses.

“What?” Mike asks.

“That’s just false hope,” Bill whispers. Richie pushes away from them all and forces himself up to his feet, shaking. His knees feel like they’re made of helium; the rest of his body is lead.

“I’m— I’m just gonna—” he says, pointing towards the hall without looking any of them in the eye. He can’t finish, so he just goes to his room, shuts the door, and collapses face-down on his bed.

He feels like his chest’s been crushed. In his mind, over and over, all he can see is Isaac getting on one knee, holding Eddie’s hand, giving him a ring. He sees their fucking  _ wedding,  _ where he’s Eddie’s stupid fucking best man like they promised when they were kids, and he has to stand right next to him and pretend it isn’t absolutely fucking  _ killing him  _ inside to live through this.

His door clicks open softly, and then there’s a gentle hand on his back again. Richie doesn’t turn over to see who it is.

“It’s going to be okay,” Stan tells him softly. Richie feels the tears come again; he can’t stop them from coming out as he starts crying into his folded arms again. Stan just rubs his back through it, doesn’t try to get him to talk.

“What do I do?” Richie asks, half-choked by tears. Stan pushes him over and lays down beside him, letting Richie curl around him, burying his face in Stan’s throat.

“Get through it,” Stan tells him honestly. Richie nods, smearing tears on Stan’s sweater. “I’m here for you, though. We all are.”

“I f— I feel—” Richie starts, then stops. There’s not words for it. He’s choked off by tears again and smothers them in Stan’s sweater.

“It’s okay,” Stan tells him, calm, steady, even. “You’re going to find someone someday. I know it doesn’t feel like it, but you will, Richie. I promise. Any man would be lucky to even know you.”

“But I don’t love anyone else but him,” Richie confesses, muffled. Stan kisses the top of his head.

“I know,” he says. “I know, Rich. I got you.”

* * *

Richie spends the next few days indoors. He calls out sick from work and just buries himself in his blankets. He misses most of Hanukkah — the parts Stan doesn’t drag him out of his room for — and he’s optimistic to miss Christmas, but a pounding at the door on Christmas Eve at near-eleven at night that nobody answers changes that.

With a sigh, Richie drags himself out of bed and finds Stan in the hallway, also making his way to the door. He waves Stan off and goes past him to wrench the thing open.

Eddie’s standing on the other side, face beet-red and snow dusting his hair and shoulders. He pushes in past him without so much as a  _ hello,  _ getting snow on Richie’s bare feet as he goes in. Stan looks just as bewildered as he feels.

“Eddie?” Stan asks. “What the fuck happened?”

Richie suddenly has a burning blast of clarity and he realizes what must have happened. His eyes go to Eddie’s hands, but he has gloves on. He wants to see the ring, abruptly, wants to  _ know,  _ wants to feel the pain in the hopes that maybe it’ll be the thing that finally pushes him over the edge and gets him to move the  _ fuck  _ on.

Eddie tears one glove off with his teeth, then the other. No ring.

Richie looks to his face.

“Isaac proposed to me,” Eddie says. He and Richie keep making eye contact as he says, “I said no.”

_ “What?”  _ Mike asks from the hallway, making Eddie yelp and whirl around, eyes flashing.

“Do not  _ scare me,”  _ Eddie spits.

“Who’s the one shouting in the middle of the night in my apartment?” Mike asks. Bill’s head pops out of their room, hair a mess as he rubs at an eye with one fist.

“Who’s here?” Bill asks blearily.

“Eddie,” Mike calls back.

“He didn’t get engaged,” Stan adds. Richie can barely hear them over the sound of his blood rushing in his ears. He’s pretty sure Eddie-related stress has shaved at  _ least  _ five years off his life in the past week  _ alone. _

“Really?” Bill exclaims. “I mean— Oh, shit, Eddie—”

“Stop,” Eddie cuts him off. Everyone goes quiet as Eddie looks to Richie. “Can I talk to you?”

_ There goes another two years,  _ Richie thinks, even as he nods and lets Eddie lead him back to his own bedroom. He avoids the eyes of their friends as the door clicks shut behind them. Once they’re alone, Eddie sighs, his shoulders slumping as he rubs at his face.

“I felt like I should explain myself,” Eddie tells him. “Isaac told me you said getting me a ring was a good idea.”

Richie’s blood is ice water. “Not a— Not a good idea. Just that I— I wasn’t going to stop him. I’m not—”

“It’s fine,” Eddie says. “I know why you would. I would’ve done the same thing, I haven’t been very—” Eddie motions with his hands, then groans in frustration. “I don’t think I’m really in love with him.”

Richie’s heart picks up. “Really?”

“No,” Eddie says. “So, I broke it off.”

Richie feels— fucking  _ clotheslined.  _ “You— You  _ broke it off?” _

“I don’t think he’s the right one for me,” Eddie explains. “But I want to find someone who is, I think. I think this made me realize that.”

Richie nods, his jelly-legs going out from under him. He sits down hard on the edge of his bed, and Eddie follows him.

“Did you help Isaac with my Christmas gifts?” Eddie asks quietly. Richie nods. “And my birthday gifts?” He nods again. “Anything else?”

“Some dinners,” Richie says. “A couple of dates, I guess.”

_ “Why?”  _ Eddie asks. Richie had always thought it’d be Isaac who asked why; he didn’t have an answer ready, but at least his answer didn’t matter as  _ much.  _ Isaac’s feelings didn’t mean the fucking world to Richie like Eddie’s do.

“Because you deserve to be happy,” Richie decides to say, because it’s true. “He didn’t know what to do and he asked for help.”

He wants to say more, but the  _ more  _ he wants to say is all just confessions. He’s not about to go down that road on Christmas Eve when Eddie’s just broken things off with his long-term boyfriend/almost-fiancé. Those confessions stay  _ in,  _ just like they have for decades, now.

“I don’t deserve you,” Eddie tells him. Richie shakes his head. The air feels thick between them; Richie’s getting a hard time getting a read on it. He’s not sure if Eddie’s angry, or sad, or just emotional, upset and letting his feelings leak out all over his face and into the room. It all sinks into Richie’s skin like a layer of slick oil; he itches with it.

“You deserve  _ better  _ than me,” Richie says. Eddie starts to protest, so Richie stands. “I don’t really— It’s Christmas Eve.”

“You’re Jewish,” Eddie reminds him.

“I’m  _ tired,” _ Richie counters. “Are you staying over or not?”

Eddie hesitates, then nods. “I can sleep on the couch, though—”

“You don’t have a boyfriend to get jealous anymore,” Richie says, without thinking. “If you want to stay in here.”

Eddie doesn’t hesitate this time before nodding. He strips down and takes the pajamas Richie offers him, oversized though they are. It’s not until they’re in bed together, back-to-back, and Eddie’s breathing has evened out that Richie lets his guard down.

Eddie inhales, preparing to speak. Richie tenses.

“I don’t think he liked you,” Eddie says, quietly, into the darkness and silence. Richie stares hard into the pitch-black. His eyes haven’t fully adjusted yet. “Isaac, I mean.”

“I’m sorry,” Richie replies, just as soft.

“Don’t be,” Eddie says. “It wasn’t going to work out anyways.”

Richie doesn’t ask what that means. He’s terrified of the answer. Well, actually, that’s not strictly true— What he’s  _ really  _ scared of is that the answer won’t be the one he so desperately wants it to be. So, he just doesn’t ask at all.

* * *

Things change again, after that. Another upswing for the better, even if there is still that one last invisible wall between him and Eddie that Richie’s never going to let himself cross. Isaac’s gone, and Stan’s happy with Patty. They’re both single. They’re both gay. The stars are, in theory, aligned.

And Eddie still doesn’t want him.

They spend a lot of time together. Even more than they had been before, Richie thinks; before all of this, yes, but also before Isaac at  _ all.  _ It seems like he and Eddie are together from sunup to sundown, and usually even beyond, crashing at each other’s places more often than not. Richie feels selfish and a little like a liar for enjoying it as much as he does, but he keeps reminding himself Eddie is capable of hanging out with Richie exactly as much as he wants to. He has before and he is now, which leaves the question of  _ why. _

Eddie goes through a short mourning period, after Isaac, but it doesn’t even make it into February. Richie thinks he’d be inconsolable for a  _ long  _ time if he broke it off with someone he loved, but Eddie just throws himself into work and the time he spends hanging out with the Losers. And Richie. Specifically.

Richie doesn’t want to read too much into it. At the same time, though, he wants  _ so badly  _ to read so  _ deeply  _ into it that he gives himself a headache. Eddie’s seeming happier, these days. Less angry, less weighed-down. He’s stopped snapping at people; he and Stan are on much better terms than they had been before Christmas, and  _ drastically  _ better terms then they were during the whole friends-with-benefits debacle.

This is probably all why it hurts so much. Richie’s figuring that he’s some sort of— rebound friendship, maybe. Eddie lost the person he liked spending all his time with, so he’s just transitioning back to normal life by putting that all on Richie instead.

Which is  _ fine.  _ It’s great, actually, because Richie would probably cry if Eddie went to someone who  _ wasn’t  _ him with all of this, so this is for the best. Plus, Richie knows Eddie the best; he can take care of him the best, so he’ll recover best and fastest. That’s what he tells himself, anyways, when his chest hurts late at night, while Eddie sleeps curled around him for the fifteenth night in a row, not that anybody’s counting.  _ Eddie  _ seems more comfortable with Richie than ever.  _ Richie  _ is trying desperately to keep his feelings shoved down to the very pit of his stomach, away from his heart and his brain, off of his face, off of his sleeve.

Eddie transfers  _ all  _ his emotions about Isaac over to Richie, as it turns out. He starts getting dinner with him. Richie even fucking  _ makes him dinner,  _ because stupid fucking  _ Isaac  _ used to do that, and he thinks it might help Eddie feel better, too.

It works, because Eddie seems to  _ love  _ that. He ups the ante, after that, taking Richie to museums, to movie theaters, to malls. He holds his hand, sometimes. He hugs Richie a lot. Like, a  _ lot,  _ and Richie’s a fairly touchy-huggy person already.  _ He  _ picked up on how dramatic Eddie’s change has been; he’s surprised Eddie’s not saying a fucking word about it. Then again, maybe it’s a, like, psychological thing, Freudian, and telling Eddie about it will just fry his brain or make him cry or something.

So, he doesn’t. Eddie keeps getting better and better, healing up, smiling more, laughing freer than ever before. Richie feels like rooms fucking light up when Eddie comes into them. He talks about Eddie like he’s a fucking murder victim on  _ Forensic Files:  _ “his smile lights up a room,” “everybody can’t help but love him,” “his hair” this, “his eyes” that. Stan listens indulgently; Patty listens intently, chin in her hands, face sparkling every time.

They feel like a  _ couple. _

Richie’s gonna  _ freak out. _

He feels, sometimes, like maybe Eddie’s flirting. Or being overly affectionate, or something. But then he remembers this is  _ Eddie,  _ who just got out of a  _ long  _ relationship — never mind that Christmas was four months ago, now — and who has never minced words with Richie before. If he wanted to be with him, he’d say it. Richie’s sure of it.

When he gets back to his apartment in mid-April, too warm in the jacket he chanced wearing that morning and ended up overheating in, he’s surprised to find Eddie in his living room. He thought he’d said something about being busy today.

“Hey, Eds,” Richie says, grinning. As much as it fucking sucks to be in love with Eddie and do all this couple shit and still not be with him, he’s still been his best friend for fucking  _ eons.  _ Eddie makes him happy no matter what else is going on. “Make yourself at home, why don’t you? Do you have squatters’ rights here at this point? I’ll actually—  _ Hey, Mike—” _

“Nobody else is home,” Eddie cuts off his shout. Richie hangs up his sweaty jacket on the coat rack and kicks off his sneakers by the door before he notices that Eddie’s laid out a whole meal for them on the low coffee table.

“So you… made dinner,” Richie says, slow. Eddie’s not good at cooking, as a rule; Richie’s responsibility is to stop him and make food  _ for  _ him, if he sees Eddie trying.

“Well, I tried,” Eddie tells him. He looks backwards at the food, then to Richie again. His hands shake with nerves when he straightens out the front of his shirt. He seems neat, put-together, hair combed and freshly washed, still curling all over his head. His big eyes are warm, and he seems  _ happy,  _ albeit anxious.

“Where’s everybody else?” Richie asks. He sits on the couch and waits for Eddie to join him. Which he does. After a long,  _ weird  _ minute. Richie drags the coffee table in closer to their legs.

“Oh,” Eddie says, like he’s only just remembered Richie asked a question. “They’re— Well. I don’t know, really, I just asked them to not be here.”

Richie frowns, lifting an upside-down plate off a dish. Once the steam clears, he sees it’s Kraft macaroni and cheese, and he laughs.  _ “I  _ see what’s going on here.”

“I’m not going to try and make fucking Beef Wellington and poison you,” Eddie tells him. His face is all red; his voice sounds  _ hot,  _ and Richie eyes him suspiciously again.

“What are you doing?” Richie asks.

“I’m in love with you,” Eddie says.

Richie stares at him. Eddie stares down at the coffee table.

“Look at me,” Richie says.

“No.”

_ “Eddie—” _

“Please,” Eddie says. He sighs, then looks to Richie; his eyes are wild. “I think I’ve been in love with you for a while, and I’m sorry I never realized that until recently, but I— I’ve realized that. Recently. Like I said.”

Richie furrows his brow. His heart’s still pounding, threatening to come up and out of his throat through his mouth, but he thinks he’s starting to figure this out.

“I can’t be your rebound, Eddie,” Richie says. Eddie’s face crumples. “No, I— I just mean, Eds, I’ve been in love with you since I was, like, six, and I know we’ve been spending a lot of time together lately because you miss Isaac, but I’ve been thinking about all of this and I think you’re just trying to replace him and I get it but I can’t—”

“Stop, stop,” Eddie cuts him off. “You think  _ you’re  _ replacing  _ Isaac?” _

“Wh— Yes?” Richie asks. “Am I—”

“He replaced  _ you,”  _ Eddie tells him earnestly. “Richie. I  _ love  _ you. How could I—” He groans, loud and dramatic, then drags his hands down his face. “How can I prove this to you, how can I—” He stops, then says, “Rich, remember when I— When I caught you and Stan? You remember?”

“Yeah, I remember,” Richie says. Eddie digs his phone out and starts scrolling quickly. “What the fuck are you—”

“Look,” Eddie says, and thrusts his phone into Richie’s hands. It’s a series of texts exchanged between him and Bill, where Eddie rants for entire paragraphs about how Stan won’t treat Richie right and how he’s going to hurt his feelings and how Richie deserves to be treated. It’s dated back to when all that shit happened at Bill’s book party.

At the end, Bill sends,  _ Maybe you’re just jealous you’re not the one treating him that way,  _ and Eddie tells him to fuck off, and they don’t text for two days before Bill texts asking if Eddie wants to meet up for dinner. Richie stares hard at the messages.

“I was jealous,” Eddie says. “That I’m not the one treating you how you deserve to be treated.”

Richie blinks again, eyes burning, and tears spill. He hadn’t even felt them come up. It’s like he’s dreaming when he asks, “How should I be treated?”

“Like you’re special,” Eddie says. He’s halting, but the fact that he’s verbalizing this  _ at all  _ is making Richie’s bones melt and surge through his limbs like lava. It’s like springtime in his chest when Eddie continues, “You— You’re important. You’re my best friend but you’re the most important person in my life and I want to be the most important person in  _ yours.” _

“You are,” Richie tells him. Eddie furrows his brow.

“I’m—”

“You  _ are,”  _ Richie says. “I  _ just  _ told you I’ve been in love with you since I was  _ six,  _ Eds.”

Eddie hesitates, then grins, his whole face breaking open like sun coming through the clouds. “Fuck, you did—”

Richie moves in first, kissing Eddie as hard as he can. Eddie doesn’t hesitate before kissing him back, his hands threading up and through Richie’s hair, tightening and using the leverage to tip his head roughly to the side. Richie groans.

“Fuck, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—” Eddie pulls back and starts to say, but Richie yanks him in for another kiss. He’s spent entire chunks of his life dreaming about this  _ exact  _ moment, even though he never imagined it would ever  _ actually  _ come.

If Richie didn’t believe Eddie before, he’d believe him now. He can feel how serious Eddie is in the way his hand glides across Richie’s skin, the way his bruising grip holds Richie tight as he pushes him back into the sofa and climbs into his lap. He lifts his head, then drags his hands down Richie’s chest. He grabs his shirt by the hem and yanks it up and off.

“I’ve been going fucking  _ insane,”  _ Eddie tells him urgently. He drops his head to suck a mark into Richie’s throat before he says, “I’m so fucking jealous all the ti— You’re not fucking Stan and Patty, are you?”

Richie jerks back. “What kind of—  _ No,  _ I am not fucking Stan  _ and  _ Patty—”

“You guys spend a lot of time together,” Eddie says. “You’ve— I was just confused, I thought maybe the three of you—”

“Eds,  _ no,”  _ Richie tells him. “I was— Oh, fuck, I didn’t tell— I was with Stan because of you.”

Eddie fully sits up now. After a beat, he stands, pushing the coffee table away so he has space. Richie just looks up at him, eyes wide, shirtless. He doesn’t even know where the fuck his shirt  _ went. _

_ “What?” _ Eddie demands. “What do you  _ mean,  _ you were with Stan because of me? Did I suggest—”

“No,” Richie cuts him off. The sooner they get this out of the way, the sooner Eddie gets back in his lap, so he answers honestly, “I was upset because I thought I’d never get to be with you and Stan felt the same way about Patty and I just— I didn’t want to be alone but I couldn’t really  _ be _ with anyone who wasn’t you.”

Eddie’s silent. He just stares down at him.

“Hence the friends with benefits thing,” Richie adds. “With Stan.”

Eddie still doesn’t answer.

“You’re freaking me out,” Richie says. “Are you mad? Please don’t be mad—”

“I’m not  _ mad,”  _ Eddie tells him. “I—” He motions to himself, then says, “I’ve just been worried that you’d still be in love with Stan, but now I just have to worry about being fucking worse at sex than Stan—”

“You’re not gonna be worse at sex than Stan!” Richie exclaims, wondering how the  _ fuck  _ that’s something he needs to say today. “Holy shit, you’re different people—”

“That’s a  _ bad  _ answer,” Eddie cuts him off.

“You’re going to be good!” Richie tells him. “But you won’t be if you don’t  _ do  _ anything—”

“How am I supposed to  _ do anything,”  _ Eddie says, imitating Richie’s voice a little  _ too  _ well, “when all I can fucking think about is you and Patty talking about what a good lay Stan is, fucking— And Stan’s just sitting there like, fucking  _ smiling,  _ joking about what a mistake it was to get you and Patty together, and I just—” Eddie stops, takes a deep breath. “I swear, Richie, I saw fucking  _ red.  _ I just— What the  _ fuck—” _

“Hey, whoa,” Richie cuts  _ him _ off, this time. “I’m not with Stan anymore. I’ve  _ never  _ been with Patty, I don’t know  _ where  _ you got the idea that I was looking for a lady, but I’m one-hundred-percent gay and also one-hundred-percent stupid in love with  _ you,  _ Eddie.” He reaches out and catches Eddie’s wrist, then tugs him in. He presses a kiss to the palm of Eddie’s hand. “You could give me the worst blowjob of my life and it’d still be the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me, because it’s  _ you,  _ Eddie. I’m fucking  _ in love  _ with you. Anything we do is going to be amazing.”

Eddie’s face is pink again, now, but he smiles a little when he looks down at Richie again. “And I’m better at sex than Stan?”

“Well,” Richie says, “I’m yet to see evidence of that.”

Eddie turns his hand in Richie’s so he can grab  _ him _ by  _ his  _ wrist and haul him to his feet. He covers the dishes Richie had opened on the table back up one-handed, still holding tight to Richie, before he drags him down the hall to his bedroom.

“I remember the sofa pact,” Eddie says. Richie rolls his eyes, because the stupid  _ no-sex-on-the-couch  _ rule that he, Stan, Bill, and Mike made when they moved in shouldn’t extend to him and Eddie when they’ve been in love  _ forever— _

—And Richie is instantly distracted from whatever he was thinking about, because Eddie’s pulling him to his bedroom and saying things like,  _ Richie, I’m in love with you,  _ and Richie’s about to lose his whole fucking mind.

“I’ve been so lonely,” Richie says, when they’re in his room with the door shut tight, even though  _ Eddie’s  _ the one who made sure that nobody else was home. “You don’t know how lonely I’ve been, I just— Being with Stan was the only time I haven’t felt that alone in  _ so  _ long—”

“Don’t talk about him,” Eddie says. He nudges Richie backwards, guiding him down until he’s sitting at the foot of his bed. He kisses him again, then pushes him lightly until he’s laying flat on his back. Eddie sits up over his hips. “I’m going to make sure you never feel lonely again, okay?”

“Okay,” Richie says. Eddie’s hands leave blazing trails as they run down his bare chest; he’s  _ never  _ felt touched like this, never, not even by Stan, not by  _ anyone.  _ When Eddie looks at him, he  _ sees  _ him, and nobody sees Richie like Eddie.

“Scoot up,” Eddie instructs him. Richie does as told, digging through his nightstand for lube and a condom. “I’m— Okay, don’t make fun of me, I got tested because I wanted to bareb—”

_ “Yes,”  _ Richie interrupts him, tugging him down with two fingers hooked in his shirt collar for another kiss. Eddie huffs against his mouth but kisses him again anyways.

“Only if you’re okay with that,” Eddie tells him. He sets the lube and condom aside and strips Richie’s pants off, slow, pulling them down his legs inch by inch and sliding off with them. Richie props himself up on his elbows to watch him.

“More than okay,” Richie manages. Eddie pulls his shirt off over his head; Richie’s mouth goes dry. “Oh, motherfucker—”

“Shh,” Eddie says, smiling when he steps out of his pants and lets them fall to the floor. He climbs up over Richie’s legs again, climbing his body up the bed like he’s scaling him, until he can latch onto the space beside the hollow of his throat and bite another hickey into his soft pec.

“Eddie, please,” Richie says. He’s not sure what he’s asking for, but,  _ fuck,  _ he is  _ begging  _ for it. Eddie puts a finger to Richie’s lips, then grabs the lube and slips his own boxer-briefs off. Richie’s still got his underwear on, cock throbbing in the confines of it. He’s almost jealous of Eddie for getting to sit back on his heels like that and start opening himself up.

“Fuck,” Eddie lets slip out of his mouth. He moans, then says,  _ “Rich,”  _ all low, throaty, heady, and Richie quickly wriggles out of his own underwear. He snaps them like a rubber band over the side of the bed before reaching for Eddie’s hair, pulling him up for another kiss.

“You want me to fuck  _ you?”  _ Richie asks. “You were kinda giving me an energy like you wanted to be in charge here.”

“I  _ am  _ in charge here,” Eddie says, one eyebrow up. “And I’m going to sit on your cock and ride you, if that’s okay with you.” Richie’s mouth  _ and  _ throat are dry, now, and his heart’s swelled up so much it’s blocking his lungs, he thinks; his cock’s definitely done swelling of its own, which might be what’s  _ really  _ distracting him.

“That’s— Yup,” Richie finally manages. “That’s good.”

“Good,” Eddie says, before sinking a third finger into himself. Richie can only prop himself up on his elbows again and watch, cock getting impossibly harder, as Eddie fingers himself open. Richie’s name spills out of his mouth again, and again, more than once,  _ unbidden,  _ like he doesn’t even  _ mean  _ to say it, and Richie feels like his neck is about to snap from how vicious his whiplash has been today.

“Eds, you gotta touch me,” Richie chokes out, when Eddie shifts to get his pinky in and Richie’s cock pulses painfully. “Eddie—”

“Okay, okay,” Eddie tells him, pulling his fingers out of his ass slowly. “Needy.”

Richie full-body flushes instantly, entirely red within seconds, so Eddie ducks his head and kisses up his soft belly, his chest, the column of his throat. When he gets to his jaw, Richie can feel Eddie’s smile pressed close to his cheek, to his skin and bone.

“I like it,” Eddie tells him softly. He kisses Richie’s cheek, then murmurs, “I like that you need me. I  _ want _ to be wanted.”

“You are,” Richie says. Eddie kisses his lips, then wraps his hand around Richie’s cock. Richie groans brokenly into his mouth; lube-slick fingers move without hesitation anyways, slipping up Richie’s cock and  _ down,  _ up and  _ down,  _ over and over, until he’s fucking  _ throbbing  _ in Eddie’s small, strong hands.

“Please,” Richie manages to get out, and Eddie takes pity on them both then, lifting himself up over Richie and guiding the head of his dick to his loose entrance. Richie grips Eddie’s hips, holds him up until he’s ready to move down. He’s not expecting it, but Eddie goes halfway down, exhales, then goes the rest of the way, spearing himself on Richie’s cock so fast that all the breath  _ whooshes  _ out of Richie’s lungs. He tips his head back into the mattress, moaning so loudly he’s momentarily grateful beyond belief that Eddie cleared out the apartment before doing this.

“Tell me,” Eddie says. He rolls his hips up, lifting off Richie’s cock before fucking himself back down on it. A small whimper slips out of his mouth before he visibly steels himself and says, “Tell me how you feel about me.”

“I’m fucking in love with you,” Richie tells him, a babbled rush that spills off his tongue. “I’ve been in love with you so long, I think about you all the time, I’ve been so l— lonely without you, I’ve—  _ Eddie—” _

“That’s it,” Eddie says. He leans over, back arching in a perfect curve as he kisses Richie again, fucking himself down harder, faster. Richie clings to his hips, then moves up, pulling Eddie’s head to his with his two hands threaded through his hair. Eddie inhales sharply.

“I love you,” Richie says again. Eddie bites into his throat, and Richie  _ whines,  _ long and low, before gasping for air. Eddie sucks another hickey into his skin below that mark, and then another, and Richie can’t stop himself from whimpering; his thrusts upwards to meet Eddie’s are starting to lose the rhythm Eddie’s set for him already. Lucky him, though, Eddie’s perfect,  _ pretty  _ cock is standing straight up against his belly, so hard that he’s flushed nearly purple.

Richie takes a chance, reaches out and wraps his fingers around Eddie’s cock. Eddie sobs once, a broken sound that tears up and out of his chest; his face slips up into Richie’s vision before he lets his eyes slide shut in their kiss again.

The hair under Richie’s fingers is sweat-damp and frizzed, curling up around his fingers as he guides Eddie’s face into a deeper kiss, parting his lips with his tongue and sliding along Eddie’s teeth and tongue until Eddie’s rhythm skips, too.

“I’m in love with you,” Richie says again.  _ “Only  _ you, this is— Eds, I’m telling you, it’s the  _ best  _ fucking sex I’ve ever had, you have  _ nothing  _ to worry about—”

_ “Richie,”  _ Eddie interrupts him, loud, unabashed, before he ducks down for another kiss. Against Richie’s mouth, he says, muffled and rushed, “I fucking love you, I’m so in love with you, please let me—  _ Please  _ let me—”

He doesn’t say what he wants Richie to please let him do, but Richie has a pretty good guess. He nods, kissing Eddie one last time before Eddie lifts himself back up again.

“Yes,” Richie breathes.  _ “Yes,  _ of course, yes—”

Eddie drops his head back; Richie’s transfixed by the strong line of him from shoulders and throat to his trim waist, over genuine muscles that flex and bend under his skin as he shivers, his cock flushed dark against his belly still. Richie refocuses his efforts, tugging Eddie’s hips closer so they’re angled down and his cock’s pressed between the both of them.

“Go ahead,” Richie tells him. Eddie doesn’t hesitate with his permission before he fucks himself down on Richie’s cock, trying to get friction on his own dick as he goes by fucking up between their bellies, too. Whatever rhythm he finds, it  _ works;  _ in the next second, he’s gasping Richie’s name again.

Eddie shifts, and he’s found his prostate. He clings to Richie’s shoulders, fucking himself down hard and fast until he’s coming all over them both. Richie feels like he’s dripping with Eddie’s cum, which is arguably the  _ best  _ feeling he’s ever felt, right above the way his chest aches watching Eddie pant to catch his breath above him, his chest rising and falling rapidly.

“Eddie,” Richie says, choked. He’s still painfully hard and still seated fully in Eddie, his walls tightening and fluttering around him as he comes down from his climax. Eddie full-body exhales, his shoulders relaxing, before he looks down to Richie.

“Hold on,” Eddie tells him, which is all the warning he gets before Eddie starts to move again. He whines, a noise Richie’s never heard Eddie make before,  _ never,  _ and he’s  _ sure  _ of it, because if he  _ had,  _ he would’ve died a  _ long  _ time ago due to complications from hearing it. On the next shift, he’s able to suppress his instinctive sounds as Richie’s cock brushes up against his overstimulated prostate again, but that’s all it takes for Richie to cum inside him.

Eddie drops himself down, slowly rocking his hips through Richie’s orgasm, milking the every fucking wave of his climax from him, dragging the sensation out until Richie’s whimpering into his mouth, overwhelmed and getting too overstimulated himself.

When Eddie finally gets his presence of mind back, he slips up and off of Richie’s cock, then collapses next to him in bed, his chest still heaving. Richie feels like he’s run a fucking  _ marathon,  _ but then, he’s not a regular runner like Eddie is, so how would he know.

“I’m in love with you,” Eddie says again. Richie turns his head on his pillows to look at him, and Eddie turns to look back, already grinning at him.

“I love you,” Richie says. He grins right back, rolling up and over Eddie, clutching him to his chest. Eddie exclaims in surprise as Richie excitedly repeats, “I love you, I love you,  _ I. Love. You—” _

“Alright,  _ alright,”  _ Eddie laughs, smothered under Richie’s hands and mouth as he kisses him again. When they separate, Eddie says, “I love you,” again, like he  _ has  _ to.

“I’ve wanted to say it so long,” Richie says. “And have you know what I mean. It’s fucking hard keeping secrets from you when you’re my best fucking friend, Eds.”

“You did a good job,” Eddie tells him. He props himself up on his elbow. “Too good a job, actually. You should be worse at lying, then we could’ve gotten together way sooner.”

“Just let me enjoy today before we go into  _ could’ve  _ and  _ should’ve,”  _ Richie tells him.

Richie tugs Eddie in for a close-mouthed kiss, this time, more chaste than anything, before he drops his head on Eddie’s shoulder, wrapping around him as much as Eddie twines around  _ him  _ in return. Richie loves the indistinguishable tangle of limbs they become; he loves  _ them,  _ he loves that they  _ are  _ a  _ them,  _ he’s in  _ love. _

“Can you hand me my phone?” Richie asks. Eddie leans over and grabs it off the nightstand to pass over.

“Why?” Eddie asks. Richie types in his passcode and Eddie smiles when he sees what it is.

“I’m gonna text Stan,” Richie says. Eddie looks over his shoulder as Richie sends, to his group chat with Stan  _ and  _ Patty,  _ Eddie fessed up, turns out we’re both stupid, don’t come in my room for a week. _

_ Don’t have to ask me twice,  _ Stan sends back within seconds. Then, the dots appear again, signifying he’s typing, before another message appears.  _ I’m really happy for you guys. _

_ It’s about time!!,  _ Patty’s text comes through.  _ Love you both of you idiots! _

“That’s nice,” Eddie says dryly. Richie texts,  _ double dates soon?,  _ and Eddie groans, “Oh, Jesus  _ Christ.” _

“It’s Stan and Patty,” Richie reminds him. Eddie shakes his head, pulling him in again. Richie’s heart flips over and settles, finally contented.

“I don’t want to see anyone else right now,” Eddie says. “Don’t even want to think of anyone else.”

“Don’t be a sap,” Richie says, feeling choked up again. Eddie presses a kiss to his temple.

“How soon can I suck your dick?” Eddie asks, and Richie chokes on a laugh before lifting his head to kiss Eddie again.

“As soon as you want,” Richie says, and Eddie smiles and leans in to kiss him as he continues, “Your wish is my command, Eds.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can (and should!) come chat with me on Twitter at [@nicolelianesolo](https://twitter.com/nicolelianesolo) and/or on Tumblr at [andillwriteyouatragedy](http://andillwriteyouatragedy.tumblr.com/).


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